Get your business on TV

When it comes to publicising your business, one of the most powerful mediums is television. So how do you get on the small screen? Yesterday, I taped a segment on the Susie show on WIN TV, hosted by the effervescent Susie Elelman. Screening at midday on weekdays, the show is broadcast to regional Australia.

Shows in this format are very popular. Just think Sunrise, Kerrie-Anne Kennerley, and 9am with David and Kim. It's an excellent chance for you to be interviewed about your business.

Susie interviewed me about one of my businesses, a fashion and accessories label. In a brief four minute segment, we covered the history of my business, where to buy the products and were even able to showcase six outfits on some gorgeous models. It was short, sharp and very visual.

After all, that's the vital element about television. You have to have good visuals to go with your story. You might have the most amazing business in the world, but if you can supplement your story with good visuals, then this risks viewers turning off or switching stations.

So if you are trying to pitch your business as a story idea to television, what should you do?

Contact the show

Contact the producer or researcher of the show and discuss your story idea with them. Make sure you are able to explain your business and what you do with a succinct summary. If you are worried you are going to stumble over your words, write a little script so you can read it (but don't make it sound like you're reading!).

What would be interesting to that show's viewers?

Don't just call a show and tell them about your business. The show will only be interested in you if you can provide relevant or interesting information for their viewers. Work out who the viewers are and make sure you pitch an idea that would be appealing to them. For example, let's say you are a gym owner or fitness trainer. If the viewership consists mainly of housewives, you can talk about how to get fit around the home, or how to incorporate a fitness routine with looking after kids. If the viewership is busy executives, you can talk about how to get fit in your lunch hour, or exercises that can be done at your desk.

Suggest good visualsAlways make sure you suggest some visual elements. The show may or may not go with your suggestion, but it will help them figure out other visuals to splice in with your interview. A straight interview of two people talking to each other isn't very exciting. That's why we brought clothes to show off on models. In the segment before me, athlete Shelley Taylor-Smith talked about how to have a champion mindset. This is tough to illustrate with visuals but Taylor-Smith had the great idea of bringing an Australian flag, wearing her green and gold trakkies and displaying all her medals - because those are the symbols of a champion mindset for her.

Avoid the hard sellMake sure you are not completely product focused. This is very hard sell and is more suitable to an advertisement than an interview. For example, you might be a fitness trainer trying to get publicity for your new fitness DVD. Images of your DVD aren't very compelling. So it's more engaging if you bring before and after images of your clients - those who have used the DVD with great results.

If you are pest control expert with a great termite repellent, an image of the bottle of repellent isn't particularly engaging television. A more interesting option would be to bring a piece of wood that shows the impact of termite attack. This will help viewers identify if they have areas around the house which are under siege from the pests.

Think outside the squareIf you are are in a service business, this might be hard to illustrate. But think outside the square. You might be a financial adviser talking about shares. Using lots of graphs and charts is not a very engaging tool for television. So what could you do? Gerald Stone writes in Who Killed Channel 9? about how producers of the Money show wanted to make it accessible to a wide audience. When Paul Clitheroe spoke about shares, he had a pizza in front of him, and explained that getting a slice of pizza was like getting a piece of a listed company.

Make sure that you think about how television works before you even pitch your idea to a producer or researcher. If you help them out with ideas, you'll have a better chance of success on the small screen.

Posted
by Valerie KhooAugust 3, 2007 10:45 AM

LATEST COMMENTS

Hi Valerie,

I was wondering if you still had the contact for WIN TV, would you mind passing those details onto me.

I very much want to get on TV to present our business vision and to demonstrate / explain how a simple to use medical device, can impact so greatly on people's lives bringing relief and quality of life back in so many ways.

The product is the ELANRA MEdical IONISER and it is an Austrlian Invention and manufactured here too. It is exported worldwide and is included as a medical device on the Australian Register of Therapeutic Goods. ARTG Number: 138923

I hope to hear back from you soon.

Kind regards,

Barry Davis

Posted by: Barry Davis on April 3, 2008 3:58 PM

Hi Peter,

Sure thing. I'll contact you directly about this.

Cheers,
Valerie

Posted by: Valerie Khoo on August 6, 2007 12:32 PM

Valerie,
I have just returned from Siem Reap (Angkor Wat). I would love to find out more about your charity work over there, as well as talk more with you about the sucess you have had since presenting on the Susie show. Thankyou for your blog.
Peter Horsfield

Posted by: Peter on August 5, 2007 9:56 AM

Do people still watch TV these days??? I thought TV had gone the way of the Dodo, the Tassie Tiger, the Leyland P76 and Beta videos.

The commercial channels have shown no respect to viewers and when they broadcast wall to wall advertising and garbage like Big Brother then its time to switch off and use other media such as DVDs, music or the internet.

Posted by: Disillusioned on August 3, 2007 5:30 PM

Hi Valerie - make it easy for them to sell you as worth their audience's interest? - thanks for the 'heads up'.